Blessed are those hungry in appetite, that they be surrounded by great pies and coffee, and cuisine from Indian to Thai, to exotic (think turtle soup!) and the common (McDonald’s), for they shall find culinary comfort day after day.

Yes I am one of those blessed people. And I say this with sincere gratitude to God. No jokes. Where I work, I am spoiled for choice when it is lunch time. Which makes me very excited every single day. Having worked where I’m working for 2 years + now, I have seen eateries come and go. The saddest exit that I still mourn over, is the closure of the Indian coffeeshop just opposite my shophouse office. Sigh.

But as they always say – when one door closes, another one opens. Hell-ya! Since mid last year, so many cool outfits have opened within 1 km of my office. Hurrah! Chye Seng Huat Hardware, Broers, L’etoile, Suprette are some of the gems that I visit quite so often. They’ve been blogged to death so I don’t see a need to expound on how great they are.

But the latest addition to the neighbourhood – Windowsill Pies have gotten me all hot and bothered, in all the right ways so I have to declare my love here!

Pies/tarts are a tricky thing to bake and through my personal attempts (apple pie, kiwi tart etc), I have learnt how difficult it is to get all the pie-components right. For me, a good pie has to have a: crisp crust and base, decent filling (if it’s an apple pie, give me my apples, don’t stinge!), and a good balance of flavours (sweet & salty is my fav combo at this moment. no surprises there). And I’m very surprised that Windowsill Pies does all these to perfection! Many times, I’ve lamented about the lack of good pie shops (it’s sad to have to go to Starbucks or Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf for a pie fix. it’s a coffee joint for goodness sake!) here. Whoever the pie guru behind Windowsill Pies is, I want to salute you. Your pies are a bit pricey ($7.60+ per slice) and I baulked at it first. But once I tasted the first forkful, I was sorry I complained about the price in the first place.

You guys have got it right in so many ways.

Your pies are a huge draw and better yet, your decor – makes me want to come back again and again.
Such whimsy!

From your wooden larger than life tree, to the side ceiling to floor window area, to your furniture and adorable tree door handle. I wouldn’t mind living in your cafe. This is the exact style I would follow for my own future house. Seriously!

Though I have yet to try their entire repertoire, I am confident that the rest of their pies are great as well. At least that’s what I’ve heard from online chatter.

I did enjoy the two slices I had: The Sam Willows & the Strawberry Lemon Tart. The Sam Willows Pie is ‘a quartet of pear, peanut butter, hazelnuts and rosemary’ (from their site). This is a combination I wouldn’t have thought of myself. Loved the pear and while I was trying to guess the cream layers at the bottom (hazelnut, rosemary and peanut butter), I thought it worked. Like I said – salty, sweet pairings are my current loves. I don’t normally describe pies as fragrant. But this one was. I like sniffing my food. Yes, I’m weird that way but hey I loved the scent of The Sam Willows.

The Strawberry Lemon Tart – if you have a low tolerance for sour, then you shouldn’t try it. Myself, however, I lapped it up like a hungry puppy. I think they used Meyer Lemons (these have a slightly sweet profile, even though it’s lemony sour.) for these. Think of it like lemon curd mixed with tarty sweet strawberry jam. So so good.

Come to this side of the woods if you ever feel like having some good pie. It’s worth a trip I tell you.

As for me, haha, I’m still laughing happily at the convenience of having this place just a stone’s throw away from my office.

Do you still remember those days back in primary school where we had to learn all about the 5 human senses in science class?

There’s the sense of touch, smell, sight, hearing and of course taste.

I was one of those students who would stop to think of how miserable it’ll be to be lacking from one or two of those senses. A discussion of whether it is worse to be blind or deaf would then ensue.

Funny how we didn’t discuss the possibility of being deprived of the remaining 3 senses. But now when I think about it, I believe I would probably be crushed if I had lost my sense of taste.

You would know. You read my blog and you are well aware of how much I love food. I enjoy my sense of taste. I truly appreciate my ability to taste and differentiate between sweet, sour, salty, spicy and bitter. But it’s weird though, when I think of it now. How often do we stop to think of this amazing organ of a tongue we have. Not only does it enable us to speak but also to taste.

Why am I suddenly ruminating about the sense of taste? It’s probably also due to the fact that I’m currently reading this book by Dina Cheney, entitled Tasting. Okay it’s one of those enlightening informative DK books but it’s really good. My boss lent it to me a while ago and it sure is useful. The book basically explores the sense of taste and how we can enhance it, truly appreciate it and utilise it for what it’s worth. To put it simply – savour, instead of gulping or swallowing ; take your time with small bites instead of rushing.

These days, I try to stop and taste more. To slow down instead of gobble. Trust me, it does work and you’ll feel better about it. When you taste, you avoid senseless eating. You eat not because you are bored but because you want to savour that taste. And speaking of taste, perhaps I’ll talk about one of my favourite taste – Tangy.

I love tangy foods. It verges on being sour and a tad sweet, it gives you the best of both worlds. It’s the perfect balance! And one of my favourite tangy dessert is lemon poppy seed cake. The bonus is the crunch that comes with the seeds. You can’t ask for anything better! With this cake there’s no pretense, there’s no cover-ups and there’s no superficiality. What you see is what you get: a tangy light cake that goes well with tea. or coffee if you prefer

Recently, I put my poppy seed stash to good use and tried out two different recipes for good measure. The first involves heavy cream for that lovely rich crumb that’s not too heavy. Then there’s the other recipe that involves yoghurt – this cake was denser, but tasty nonetheless.

This cake is what I’ll call a rustic cake. It’s not fancy, there’s no frills – what you have is texture, and a homemade flavour. I’ve tried other poppy seed cake recipes but none have given me results quite like this one. The base recipe’s usually a butter cake but there’s always something missing. And I think I found it in this recipe.

For this recipe, you don’t put the lemon juice in the batter. It goes on after you bake it. Yes, you read that right. The cake becomes a sponge, absorbing the tangy goodness and drinks it up like a dry sponge would. I think this method works brilliantly.

Friends who’ve tried this cake seem to like it. Good, so that means it’s not that I’m being biased because I made it! haha.

Now, for the yoghurt version. It all started because I had a huge tub of yoghurt at home and wanted to use it to make something. So I started googling ‘yoghurt cake’.

The results?

I’ll show it instead:

You can see the difference. It isn’t as crumbly as the first one, but it’s satisfying nonetheless and yes it’s healthy! Perfect with vanilla ice cream.

Lemon poppy seed cake is one cake that deserves more recognition. With warm chocolate cakes and brownies stealing the limelight most of the time, it’s hard for poppy to stand out. But hey, at least one thing’s for sure, it sure is tasty, in a tangy crunchy sort of way.

This year, I will focus more on rustic and non-chocolate You could say I’m exploring taste and taking it to a new level. Don’t get me wrong – I still love my dark chocolate. But sometimes, you got to go out there and taste the world, out of your comfort zone!

1. Preheat oven to 150 degrees C. Grease the bottom and sides of a loaf tin and dust with flour.2. Sift the flour, baking powder and salt into a bowl. Add the poppy seeds and whisk to combine.3. In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat the butter with a paddle attachment till it is very creamy, about 2 mins.4. Add the sugar and beat at medium-high speed until very light, about 4 mins.5. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.6. Beat in the lemon zest and vanilla extract.7. Add the flour at low speed in three additions, alternating it with the cream in two additions. Mix only until the flour is incorporated.8. Scrape the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top.9. Bake for about an hour or until a skewer inserted comes out clean.10. Remove the pan from the oven and let it cool on a wire rack for 10 mins.11. While the cake is cooling, make the syrup.12. Combine the water and sugar in a small saucepan and cook over medium heat till the sugar dissolves.13. Remove from the heat and stir in the lemon juice.14. Poke the cake all over at 1-inch intervals with a bamboo skewer and then brush it with half the lemon syrup.15. Let the cake stand for 5 mins, then invert the cake onto the wire

rack and poke the bottom all over with the skewer.16. Brush the bottom and sides of the cake with the remaining syrup.17. Turn the cake upright on the rack and let cool completely.